Scuffling and crunching ice caught my ears. I turned my head to see the snow's surface not far from me bobbing up and down like a sea creature almost emerging from the face of water.
A few moments later, two eyes set upon two rosy red cheeks popped up from the ground, peeking out at the mountains, making a long-distance scan across every surface until it set its squinty eyes upon me.
A small purple hand reached before the widening eyes, followed by a second hand, and the face flung forward, flicking ice overhead as its feet flew up sideways onto the surface. She looked terribly ill. All pale and weak like a dying flower.
"Elias," she breathed; a puff of air escaping her lips like smoke.
Her sparkly eyes rested on mine and she reached her arms out, pacing towards me. I couldn't tell whether she was about to smile or cry - probably both, with what we had endured over the past few weeks. We were the same person, Hetti and I - she was the little version of me. I saw my younger self in her, all the while seeing her as her individual self, blooming into a rose with not a single thorn.
She sped her pace into a jog and shuffled slower when reaching me, unsure of what to do next.
"Help pull me out of this," I asked in a husky voice.
Her feet slogged around my perimeter and she settled behind me, taking hold of my arms. With a "one, two, three," she and I simultaneously pushed and pulled at the weight of my frozen body, this way and that.
After ten minutes of helplessly shuffling in the snow, the containment loosened its grip from my body and my legs began to burrow upwards like some kind of shrew on a mission. Out of sheer relief, I felt that I had been born anew, kicking and screaming my way back onto land as my waist began to rise from the ground. I elbowed my way forward as Hetti continued to pull at my arms, both of us wearily working against gravity. Soon enough, I popped out of my capsule, knocking Hetti over and flopped sideways onto my waist, cold and exhausted with my legs still hanging into the hole.
We had agreed that we could no longer waste any more time and within a few short moments, were once again on our feet, trudging up the pathless hill with all its grandiosity looming down over us. Among its deadly reputation, its beauty sat pronounced - the way its white sheath of snow sparkled as skylight scattered from every granule. Nevertheless, its reputation was still deadly.
And at the foot of it all, stood two young girls with newborn flames set alight in their spirit. We were unstoppable.
YOU ARE READING
The Edge of Siberia
FantasyTwo sisters are the last survivors of a Russian village that has been obliterated by orcs. In attempt to escape the village, the girls retreat to a train running through the snowy mountains into the deadly Siberian winter, hurtling towards the unkno...
